Twenty-year-old Tiawanda Moore went to Chicago Police Headquarters to report being fondled by an officer. But Internal Affairs didn't want to take her complaint. After asking for new investigators and being refused, Moore turned on her Blackberry recorder to document this second instance of police misconduct. When the investigators realized they were being taped, they promptly arrested Moore for eavesdropping, a charge that carries a sentence of up to 15 years.

Meanwhile, as Moore awaits trial in May, no disciplinary action has been taken against the officer who groped her. (Not to mention the officers who refused to accept her complaint. Moore's lawyer, Robert Johnson, reports that officials "claim the investigation is not completed" -- even though it's been over half-a-year since Moore attempted to make her complaint. As the "investigation" drags on for no apparent reason, the police officer has not been temporarily suspended, and is free to continue assaulting and harassing other women.

The Chicago Taskforce on Violence against Girls and Young Women has taken up Tiawanda Moore's cause and launched a petition on her behalf on Change.org, calling for Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez to drop the eavesdropping charges and for the police sexual misconduct investigation to be undertaken in a timely manner.

We are pleased to announce the launch of AWID’s Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Compendium in wiki format.

The aim of the wiki is to gain deeper insight into how different M&E frameworks, approaches, and tools have been used and adapted by women’s organizations to capture the complexity of changes in women’s rights and gender equality work. To that end, we provide a brief overview and critical analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of some of the leading M&E frameworks, approaches, and tools. The Compendium is intended to be a living document and has been designed to be updated regularly by members of the women’s rights community with particular attention on sharing organizations’ experiences in using these tools.

PARIS — “I am a woman, a Socialist, divorced and agnostic,” the new defense minister told the generals of her Roman Catholic country. “But we will work together very well.”

Michelle Bachelet, who in 2002 became Chile’s first female defense minister and four years later the country’s first female president, has never shied from challenging the status quo. Now the first head of U.N. Women, the three-month-old U.N. agency for gender equality and female empowerment, Ms. Bachelet is doing it again — this time turning some traditional notions of feminism on their head.

“We need men. We need to obtain big important male champions,” Ms. Bachelet, a 59-year-old daughter of a general and single mother of three, said brightly during a recent interview in Paris.

She hired a man as one of her two deputies — “that wasn’t by chance, I wanted gender equality” — and courts male chief executives to sign up to seven principles for female empowerment. A new three-year gender awareness program for peace negotiators focuses as much on training male mediators about rape in conflict zones as on grooming future female mediators.

DCAF releases updated compilation of International and Regional Laws and Instruments Related to Security Sector Reform and Gender

In recent years, international and regional organisations have adopted a number of important standards concerning the need to address gender issues in security processes and institutions. These include the new Security Council resolutions on women, peace and security.

The Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces developed a detailed compilation of the international and regional norms and standards concerning gender issues and the security sector as an annex to its 2008 Gender and Security Sector Reform Toolkit. This annex serves as a reference point for anyone working on security sector reform (SSR) or gender and security issues. It has now been fully updated to reflect developments in the United Nations, European Union, African Union and other regional organisations.

Eman is a courageous Libyan woman who broke the formidable walls of shame and fear, to speak publicly to reporters about being a rape victim, in a conservative environment where rape is a taboo subject. She risked not only her reputation but also her own life, to demand justice and the protection of her human rights. The Gaddafi media have already mobilized to assassinate Eman's character through smears and further publicized violations of her legal rights. And in the regime's known pattern of operating, Eman faces further torture, bodily harm and worse to come.

Your signing this petition is urgently needed for saving Eman and thereby empowering all Libyan civilians threatened by a tyrant who has openly declared war against them.

The International Models Project on Women’s Rights Unveils Prototype of IMPOWR Wiki in Wake of International Women’s Day

The International Models Project on Women’s Rights, established by the American Bar Association, is creating a comprehensive and collaborative online database of information on gender-equality law reform efforts around the world. Today the first prototype for this comprehensive Web site tool will be unveiled at demo.impowr.org.

The prototype content focuses on reform laws and efforts on acid violence attacks against women in Bangladesh. When the database is ready to be launched later this year, it will include information on more than 100 countries and will be searchable by country, as well as specific topic areas that include: civic life, health care, marriage and family relations, economic and social life, crimes and violence, and access to justice. Wiki entries will be contributed by experts from around the world and will describe: the current state of law in each topic area; law reform projects that have been or should be undertaken in those areas; the role of law enforcement; as well as community traditions and history vis-à-vis the effectiveness of implementation of reforms.

Salvadorian parliamentarians celebrate the approval
of the new law that addresses violence against women
(Photo: El Salvador Legislative Assembly)

A groundbreaking law aimed at halting high levels of violence against women in El Salvador, the Central American country with the world’s highest rates for murder of women, was officially made public last week following approval five months ago by the overwhelming majority of members of the national legislative assembly.

The First Comprehensive Law for a Life Free of Violence against Women contains 61 articles to uphold the rights of women through policies on detection and prevention of violence, and victim assistance and protection, among other measures.

The law will come into force next year and was endorsed after 4,000 women marched to the national assembly building to demand the Bill’s approval on 25 November 2010—‘International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women’.

“We have seen women parliamentarians from different parties arguing among each other about other issues, but on this occasion we united to pursue a common aim: that the rights of women be granted—and respected,” said Carmen Elena de Escalón, an assembly member and secretary of the Salvadorian Women’s Parliamentary Group.

The law punishes all forms of violence against women: from female murders (with 20-35 years of imprisonment for those convicted), to mocking, disparaging or isolation of women in their workplaces, communities or schools (with fines of between 2-25 times the national monthly minimum wage or through community work).

Less than six percent of the 477 women who were murdered between January and October 2010 resulted in convictions and of nearly 7,000 reported cases of sexual crimes, only 436 resulted in convictions between 2008 and 2009.

PESHAWAR, Mar 11, 2011 (IPS) - "Life is next to hell as we pass the entire day and night inside four walls of our houses. Militancy and the local male-dominated culture are the reasons for the women’s problems," says Jabeena Bibi, 38, a resident of Khyber Agency, one of the seven tribal districts of the Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) of Pakistan.

For a woman to leave home is a threat to male Pakhtun honour, Jabeena tells IPS. Such male views are dominant across this region with a population of five million alongside the porous 2,400 km border with Afghanistan, and in the adjacent Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province.

Q&A
"Women Must Be Part of the Peace Equation"
Rousbeh Legatis interviews MAVIC CABRERA-BALLEZA, Global Network of Women Peacebuilders

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 21, 2011 (IPS) - Eleven years ago, 192 countries – all the United Nations member states – agreed to step up the integration of women in international peacebuilding and security processes, a promise that has remained largely unmet.

Mavic Cabrera-Balleza notes that by having specific provisions compelling their members to implement and report progress, regional organisations like the European Union and the African Union "are a step ahead" of the United Nations, which lacks a regular accountability mechanism.

As international coordinator of the Global Network of Women Peacebuilders (GNWP), consisting of 50 women's and non- governmental organisations (NGOs) from Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Europe and Latin America, Cabrera-Balleza spoke to IPS about developments and challenges in supporting women around the world.

EDITORIAL COMMENT: This is an excellent case because the court expressly rejects the defendant’s contention that physical harm or threat of serious bodily harm is required to show force. The court embraces the idea that lack of consent, alone, is enough. The court explicitly noted that “a timid woman may not resist such an attack as far as a fearless women would" and that this difference does not justify application of a different definition of "force" as a matter of law. In short, the fact that a woman "freezes" is not only NOT evidence of consent, it is also relevant to the prosecution's proof of force, under a totality of circumstances test.

Female Genital Mutilation: Who Has the Right to Name It a Crime?
Bessie A. Winn-Afeku.Founder/Executive Director of Thesheismeprogram.org and

Violence against women has no political, social or cultural barriers, and whether it takes form of rape, domestic violence, or sexual violence, it drains women's energies and undermines all women's efforts to further their own and their communities' development. Many of the issues mentioned above are forms of violence perpetuated by men on women. Female genital mutilation or FGM, may, at least in some cases be a bit different as it is regarded as a practice carried through and even initiated by some women on other women: Woman on woman oppression. Therefore by its very nature, FGM is controversial.